High school students across Ontario have walked out of school Friday to protest changes to sex education and indigenous curriculum.
The effort is being called the March for Our Education. Students, teachers and staff at more than 100 Ontario high schools – projected to number about 40,000 – are expected to take part.
Quinn Jeffrey-Off helped organize the walk-out at Glebe Collegiate Institute. “We need to talk from our own perspectives as people who can't vote yet. And who are still in school and can speak from the perspective from a student.”
Premier Doug Ford’s government has repealed a 2015 rewrite of the sex-ed curriculum and reinstated the 1998 version while it prepares its own program. The 2015 curriculum, which covers same-sex marriage, gender identity, consent and sex in a social media age, was a controversial touchstone during the election campaign. Social conservatives vigorously objected to elements of the curriculum for elementary students, including homosexuality and masturbation. Ford has enacted a snitch line to report teachers who continue to teach the 2015 content.
“There is going to be a really big knowledge gap if people aren’t learning about and they don’t know that it’s not ok and no means no,” says another student Ottawa student.
A statement from the Ottawa-Carleton School Board says students may not be disciplined but will be marked absent.
Jeffrey-Off says, “I think people who felt affected by these changed and felt attacked and alienated are feeling a lot more welcoming among Canadians and Ontarians.”
Organizers also plan a student-led sit-in at Queen’s Park on Sunday.
With files from CTVNews.ca Staff
